A Family Feud
by Freedom Fighter
Summary: Vanessa finds herself in a life-or-death struggle after her father becomes ruthlessly evil! Who is responsible for turning Dr. Doofenshmirtz into a truly evil villain? First story in the 'Vanessa's Moral Wars' trilogy.
1. Chapter 1

**A Family Feud**  
**Chapter One**  
**Story Written by Freedom Fighter**

Onto my first ever "Phineas and Ferb" story... yeah! I just love Vanessa, so I've been waiting quite awhile to finally write this little gem. In this short three-part mini-series, Vanessa finds herself in a life-or-death struggle with her father after he becomes ruthlessly evil! Forget busting her dad... she just wants to get out of Doofenshmirtz Evil, Inc. alive!

Vanessa could use some help... but from whom? And who's responsible for turning her dad extremely evil?

A 'Doof vs. Doof' week event, inspired by the events of one of my favorite episodes, 'Vanessassary Roughness.'

**Disclaimer:** The characters of 'Phineas and Ferb' belong to Disney.

* * *

"Stand still so I can kill you!" yelled Dr. Doofenshmirtz.

Doctor Heinz Doofenshmirtz was up to another one of his schemes, having created a hand-held ray gun whose beam would disintegrate anything it hit in an instant. At the moment, he was firing it at his nemesis, trying to eliminate his foe once and for all.

But he missed, instead hitting a crate that was destroyed in the blink of an eye.

"What did I say... I said **STAND STILL!**"

He was getting angrier and angrier as he pulled the trigger again. His adversary jumped out of the way in the nick of time, the beam passing just over the right leg and onto the balcony, where it hit a potted plant... which also was gone in an instant.

Dr. D smiled as he heard the one who had come to foil his scheme start to groan and beg to be spared. But as he approached his enemy, he passed by Agent P, who was tied up with a metal chain that he was struggling mightily to break free from.

But if that was Agent P... who was Doofenshmirtz about to eliminate?

"Dad... don't!"

Vanessa Doofenshmirtz, the evil doctor's daughter, was on the floor, having found herself there after diving to avoid being hit by the previous shot. She was partially sitting up, with her arms reaching behind her and to the ground so that her body, from the waist up, made roughly a 30-degree angle with the floor.

But now her evil father was standing in front of her, his feet straddling her legs as he stood above her and pointed his ray gun at his only offspring's head.

"It looks like I'm about to become childless!" Dr. D exclaimed, a remorseless sneer creeping across his face.

The eviler-than-normal villain began to pull the trigger...

* * *

Four hours ago...

"C'mon, Dad! Where are you?"

Vanessa was standing on her front doorstep, tapping her foot with impatience repeatedly as she waited for her Dad to pick her up. All of a sudden, her cell phone began to ring. She pulled it out of her pocket and answered it.

"Dad?"

"Hi, Vanessa!" greeted Dr. Doofenshmirtz. "Sorry I forgot to pick you up, but I'm in the middle of concocting my newest evil scheme and I completely lost track of time! That, and I can't leave because apparently I'm in trouble after the building got evacuated when my delivery of uranium rods arrived this morning!"

Vanessa then heard mumbling from an unknown voice on the other side. After a few seconds, she heard her dad respond.

"Yes, I have a permit to build and operate a nuclear-powered generator! And why do you care... you're bald!"

Vanessa sighed. "So I guess I'm taking the bus downtown, huh?"

"Ooh, ooh... could you pick up a few things for me on the way?"

"Again? What makes you think..."

"You're holding pen and paper already, aren't you?"

Sure enough, Vanessa had a pen in her left hand and a notepad in her right.

"Fine."

* * *

Meanwhile, it was already afternoon in the backyard of the Flynn-Fletcher house, and Phineas and Ferb still hadn't decided what to spend this particular summer day doing. They were sitting under their tree, racking their brains for ideas.

"We've done **SO** much this summer," Phineas stated aloud. "What else is there to do?"

Phineas turned to his stepbrother, who was holding up a hardcover book that had a picture of a dodo bird on the front.

"Nah... we're not desperate enough to find one of those yet."

Suddenly, the two boys' brainstorming session was heard by the sound of someone screaming in fear. Seconds later, Baljeet ran into the yard, screaming his head off. Right behind him was Buford, who was chasing him with his right index finger sticking upwards and dripping with the bully's own saliva.

"C'mon!" Buford shouted at Baljeet. "Take your wet willy like a man!"

"I am not a man!" Baljeet cried out in response. "I am a **BOY**!"

Phineas and Ferb observed as Buford chased Baljeet all over the yard. After watching for a minute or so, an exhausted Baljeet gave up, falling to the ground in front of the stepbrothers. Buford came to a stop next to Baljeet and stuck his wet finger into the Indian boy's left ear.

"Aah, **AAHHH!**" Baljeet screamed.

Three seconds later, it was over. Buford pulled his finger out and then wiped it clean with his shirt.

"I've always wondered," Phineas thought out loud, "is there a reason you bully Baljeet all the time?"

"I dunno," Buford shrugged his shoulders. "It's my job, I guess?"

"Just like it's my job to be bullied," Baljeet added, surprisingly accepting of the arrangement.

"Maybe you do it because..." Phineas suggested to Buford, "you're evil?"

"Evil? A bad guy, yes... but me? Evil?"

"I wonder if there's a way to turn him from evil to good... or, at the very least, make him feel that he doesn't have to be a bully."

A light bulb then brightened up in Phineas' head.

"Ferb! I **FINALLY** know what we're going to do today! We should build a helmet that measures all of the good and evil inside of you, then extracts all the evil, leaving only the good behind!"

But Baljeet had an objection.

"That sounds like something you would find at a supervillain convention!"

"I suppose you have a point," Phineas agreed. "Still, I think our idea is sound. We just need a different approach. Ferb?"

Phineas looked at Ferb, who had pencil and paper ready, obviously to make a shopping list of needed parts.

* * *

An hour later, Phineas' alternate plan had come to fruition, as he and Ferb had constructed a... gumball making machine?

"Let's start 'er up!" Phineas shouted.

Ferb pushed a big green button on the side of the machine, and it started up, shaking furiously as it went to work. The four boys stepped back and let the machine do its thing. After 30 seconds, an audible ding could be heard, followed immediately by the machine shutting off by itself.

Shortly thereafter, half a dozen blue gumballs rolled out of the contraption and into a little steel candy dish.

"Voila!" Phineas said with a smile. "It's done!"

"Hey Phineas!"

The boys turned to see Isabella walk into the yard.

"Whatcha doin'?" she asked.

"We just made candy that can turn an evil person into a good person!"

"Really? That's what this thing is?"

The five kids turned the other way... to see a miffed Candace standing there, with her hands on her hips. Candace walked passed the boys and over to the machine, where she grabbed all six gumballs with one hand.

"There's something wrong with this picture... do these things explode in your mouth?"

"Well, actually..."

Not paying attention to her last sentence, Candace promptly put all six gumballs in her mouth at once and started chewing. But only for a few seconds, as they quickly dissolved in her mouth.

"What the... these aren't even decent gumballs! They're supposed to become sticky when you chew, like gum! You can't even build something worth busting you for?"

Suddenly on cue, Candace's anger changed to sunshiny delight.

"Phineas and Ferb, this is the best thing you've ever built! I'm going to tell mom and dad just so they can bask in the glow of your genius invention!"

Candace then ran back inside the house to get her cell phone.

"I guess it works," Phineas concluded, scratching his head. "But I'm confused... Candace isn't evil. Least, not the last time I checked. Must be a few kinks to work out in the ingredient formula."

"Phineas..." Isabella cut off his train of thought. "What are these?"

The boys walked over to the other side of the machine and found a second steel candy dish in which six more gumballs were now resting in. But these gumballs were red, and were the size of peas. Curious, Isabella took one and put it in her mouth. Because of its small size, she swallowed it instantly.

"You'd think we'd notice this in the blueprint," observed Phineas.

"Maybe these are gumballs that turn good people evil," suggested Baljeet. "After all, good and evil are supposed to be perfectly balanced in the world."

The boys all looked at Isabella, waiting to see if she'd do anything bad. She blinked her eyes a few times... but nothing happened.

"I guess I don't have an evil bone in my body," Isabella concluded.

"Although that's most likely true," Phineas said, the cogs in his brain began to turn, "we really do need to adjust our recipe."

The boys turned about and walked away, with Phineas leading the way to the garage. Once their backs were turned, Isabella looked at the machine in front of her and frowned.

"Why does he spend all his time making these machines?" she asked herself out loud. "He should be spending his time making me happy!"

With her left leg, Isabella casually kicked the machine once.

It then promptly blew up.

The explosion was big enough that the five remaining red gumballs flew high and far into the sky, towards downtown. But it was also small enough that, when the boys ran back to see if Isabella was okay, she was only covered in black soot and her hair had become frizzy.

"Isabella!" Phineas called out. "Are you..."

"Good news is that the evil gumballs work," deadpanned Isabella, "because this machine blew up when I kicked it. Bad news is... the machine blew up."

Isabella wasn't completely right... though the frame of the machine had broken into four big pieces that were scattered along the lawn, most of the inner mechanisms were still in place, albeit chipped or broken in some way.

"Okay," Phineas slowly agreed, not sure how to take the news. "I guess the question is... where are the rest of the evil gumballs?"

* * *

Downtown, Dr. Doofenshmirtz was arguing with a police officer who was questioning him, even as the other residents and workers of his office building were being allowed to go back inside.

"I keep telling you, I filed all of the appropriate paperwork and got all of the proper security clearances! What part of that do you not understand?"

"Fine," the officer relented, "but we'll be keeping an eye on you."

As the police officer walked away, Doofenshmirtz reached into his lab coat pocket and pulled out a small, unzipped plastic bag that had an assortment of spherical candies in it. He wasn't looking directly at it when he first pulled it out, as he continued to glare into the policeman's back. While that was happening, five pea-sized red gumballs fell from the sky and landed right into the bag.

"Law enforcement these days," the mad scientist grumbled as he headed back towards the building.

Without looking, he picked a piece of candy out of his bag at random and plopped it into his mouth. It happened to be one of the small gumballs, which he swallowed before he barely got the chance to taste it on his tongue.

"What the... well that was a waste of sugar!"

Suddenly, a strange feeling raced through Doofenshmirtz's skin. An evil feeling. Smiling snidely, he saw a young man motioning for an old woman with a cane to go through the revolving doors in front of him.

Without even thinking, Doofenshmirtz rushed for the doors, running through the old woman and knocking her down before bolting into the building.

**To be continued...**


	2. Chapter 2

**A Family Feud**  
**Chapter Two**  
**Story Written by Freedom Fighter**

* * *

Dr. Doofenshmirtz ran into his apartment and closed the door behind him. He smirked as he looked at his bag of candy and, for the first time, noticed the four remaining pea-sized red gumballs in it.

"I don't know where these things came from," he commented aloud, "but man, that was quite a rush! I think I'll have another!"

He reached into the bag and pulled out his second piece of red candy. Again, he swallowed it almost instantaneously. A few seconds later, he got the same feeling of evil rush all throughout his body.

"There we go... now I'm feeling it!"

He then looked on the ground and saw the crate that held the uranium rods that had been delivered to him and got a wicked idea.

"You know what? Screw that policeman! I was going to use these rods to create a good-natured, clean power source! But now I'll use them to concoct a weapon of mass destruction that will really show the tri-state area who's the boss! Aha ha ha ha!"

Doofenshmirtz then walked over to his work desk, which had a bunch of blueprints on it, including the project he was planning to create today... a Sugar-Away-Inator. He shoved them all off, save for a blank blueprint page that he started drawing on.

"Who cares about melting away the tri-state area's sugar supply? I've got something really evil to plan!"

* * *

Isabella, Buford, and Baljeet had gathered all of the parts from the gumball creator and were trying to see what was still usable, while Phineas was looking at the ingredient formula. Among the items on it... a quart of sugar.

"Maybe a bit too much?" Phineas asked himself out loud. "That would explain why the good gumballs had a stronger effect than the bad ones. Probably should've had someone taste test the mixture before we put it in."

"How about me?" Isabella sweetly asked.

"I was actually thinking Perry... speaking of which, where **IS** Perry?"

* * *

Perry, or rather, Agent P, was already on his way to Doofenshmirtz Evil, Incorporated by way of hoverjet, and he was being briefed on his latest mission in-flight via wrist communicator from Major Monogram.

"Good afternoon, Agent P! I'll get straight to it... we just got word that Dr. Doofenshmirtz just had a package of uranium rods delivered to him! I don't need to tell you that radioactive material in the hands of someone as evil as him is... well, not good! See what he's up to, and stop him from turning the tri-state area into a crater! Good luck, Agent P!"

Agent P saluted, then signed off.

* * *

Meanwhile, at that exact moment, Ferb was stepping off of a bus, right in front of the Superduper Mega Superstore. With a new list in hand, this one assumed to be of replacement parts, he walked inside, the sliding entrance doors moving apart as he approached it.

Once inside, he glanced down at the list again, contemplating in his mind where to start. He didn't seem to be paying attention to anyone else around him, walking around, underneath, and in-between other customers.

"Somebody hold that bus!"

Ferb stopped, hearing a familiar voice flow into his ears. He looked up just in time to see Vanessa run past him, carrying three plastic bags in her hands as she ran for the store's exit and the bus stop. As she ran out the doors and made a sharp right towards the bus, one of the objects fell out without her knowledge.

Ferb noticed this and ran outside. But by the time he got to the object, Vanessa had boarded and the bus was pulling away. He then looked down at his feet and saw that the object she had dropped was a funnel.

He picked it up with his left hand and looked at it, then at the list of parts in his right, and then back to the funnel. He had to make a split-second decision, as the bus was already heading out of the parking lot.

He crumpled up the list and stuffed it in his pants pocket, then used his now-free hand to signal for a taxi. One pulled up to the curb instantaneously and Ferb opened the door and hopped in.

"Where to?" the driver asked.

Ferb simply pointed at the bus. Quickly understanding, the driver pulled away from the store.

* * *

A few minutes later, Agent P had landed on the balcony of Doofenshmirtz Evil, Incorporated. He leaped out of his hoverjet and ran inside, to the laboratory. But as he did, a platypus-sized clear bottomless glass box fell on him, ensnaring him.

"Is that you, Perry the Platypus?"

Dr. Doofenshmirtz appeared, walking towards Agent P.

"I must apologize for reusing traps... I assure you, it's only temporary! I am working on something very important, and making sure you don't interfere with my plans has dropped on my 'things to do' list."

Perry glared at the evil scientist, crossing his arms over his chest.

"Oh, don't give me that look! I'm eviler... no, wait, evilest than before! So evil that I don't have time to worry about semi-aquatic personifications of fury! I need to find an adversary more my skill! Just as soon as I destroy the tri-state area!"

Doofenshmirtz laughed maniacally as he walked off, leaving Perry to try and remember how he got out of this trap before... and wonder why his nemesis was acting strangely abnormal. Abnormal for him, anyway.

* * *

15 minutes later, Vanessa was among a group of half a dozen people who got off of the bus at the stop in front of Doofenshmirtz Evil, Incorporated. Still unaware that she had dropped one of the items from her shopping trip for her father, she headed into the building.

As she disappeared inside and the bus pulled away from the stop, the taxi carrying Ferb came to a stop in front of the entrance.

"Okay," the driver turned around to look at Ferb, "that'll be $23.50."

Ferb reached into his pants pocket and pulled out a piggy bank, to the driver's surprise. But instead of breaking it open right there and then, Ferb just simply handed the whole thing to him. The driver took it and shook it, and heard a bunch of change jingling inside.

"Meh..." he shrugged, "sounds about right."

Ferb got out of the cab and closed the door behind him. The taxi pulled away as Ferb glanced up at the sign above the building's entrance. It read 'Doofenshmirtz Evil Inc.'

A perplexed look formed on Ferb's face. What would Vanessa be doing going to a place with that name on it?

* * *

"Dad, I'm here!"

Vanessa was walking into the lab, her plastic bags still in her hands as she used her left foot to kick the entrance door closed.

"Sorry it took so long," Vanessa apologized as she looked around for her father. "Some of the stuff on the list wasn't easy to find, and then they wouldn't let me check out at the register! They were trying to call you, trying to get you to authorize charging over your in-store spending limit..."

She then stopped when she came across Perry, now completely tied up with metal chains that made it near impossible for him to move.

"Whoa," she gasped, "I didn't think I was **THAT** late!"

Despite his restraints, Perry pulled one of his arms out of his restraints, and raised it up to his fedora. He grabbed the front of it with his hand and tipped it forward a few inches, essentially greeting Vanessa as he always did.

"Hey," she acknowledged.

She found a nearby table to put the bags down on, then she resumed her search for her dad.

"Dad? Dad?"

Walking away from Perry, who had put his arm back in between himself and the binding metal chains, Vanessa headed deeper into the lab. Eventually, she came across a steel-reinforced, pressure-sealed door that had a yellow and black sign on it.

"This was never here before..."

She then looked at the sign, wondering why it looked so familiar to her. Maybe something she had learned in school? She took a couple steps forward to examine it, when she felt her right boot hit something. Vanessa looked down and saw an open crate before her. It was filled completely with hay, except for an area of about 32 cubic feet, where a sizable rectangular indentation had been left behind. She then glanced at her foot, which had actually run into the crate's cover.

Vanessa lifted the cover up, which didn't seem out of the ordinary as it had a shipping label on it. But it was what she saw on the side of the crate that the top had been covering that made her do a double-take.

There again was the yellow and black sign, the same as on the door. And underneath were the words 'Radioactive Material - Handle with Extreme Care!'

"No way!"

Suddenly, Vanessa heard a creaking sound. She turned her attention to the door from before, noticing for the first time the wheel in the center, right underneath the radiation warning sign. And it was turning counterclockwise. After a few seconds, it stopped turning, and the door slowly opened.

Dr. Doofenshmirtz stepped out, dressed in an orange hazard suit. He was holding what looked to be a ray gun in his right hand. He turned around to close the door, turning the wheel clockwise this time.

"Okay..." Vanessa looked at him, with a stern look on her face. "What are you up to this time?"

Her dad placed the ray gun on top of a nearby empty cardboard box, and then he reached up and took off his helmet. As he soon as he did, he breathed in a fresh gasp of oxygen.

"That's better!" Heinz said with a smile.

"Since when did you dabble with radioactive material?" Vanessa asked. "And how does that relate to all the stuff you had me buy?"

Doofenshmirtz ripped off the rest of his biohazard suit, apparently one of those that were easy to tear-away, leaving him in his normal clothes, lab coat and all.

"Are you talking about the stuff for the Sugar-Away-Inator? That was **SO** four hours ago!"

Heinz picked up his ray gun and walked past his daughter, back towards his work desk. Vanessa followed him.

"Anyway," he told her, "I was originally going to use those uranium rods to create the world's first portable nuclear-powered generator."

"Didn't Uncle Roger once tell me it was illegal to have a nuclear power source in a private residence?"

"So? Besides, I changed my mind!"

Reaching the desk, Doofenshmirtz saw his bag of candy. He reached in and grabbed one of the three remaining pea-sized gumballs and put it in his mouth.

"I've created this instead!" he announced, holding up the ray gun. "I haven't thought of a name for it yet... perhaps I'll call it the Disintegrator-Inator. But I think that's a bit much."

"Much?"

"Oh, I'll just call it the Disintegrator! It should be a serious name to match my more serious demeanor!"

"Seriously?" Vanessa deadpanned.

"You see..."

Doofenshmirtz then stopped, noticing that he hadn't yet gotten the same feeling flowing through him as he did after eating the first two gumballs. He reached into the bag and ate another one. Once that one was swallowed, then he began to feel the effects.

"Oh, yeah, there we go! Anyway, Vanessa, as I was saying... I have decided to become a true dastardly villain... by concocting schemes that really do endanger the tri-state area! And it all starts with the Disintegrator! I'm still debating exactly what to use it on, but rest assured, anything the beam fired from it hits will disintegrate immediately, ceasing to exist!"

"You mean you want to use it on actual people?"

"Why, yes! Yes I do!"

Vanessa gasped. "That's evil! That's... the most evil thing you've ever tried to do!"

Vanessa pulled out her cell phone hastily.

"Forget calling mom to bust you... I'm calling the cops!"

Vanessa flipped the cover off and was about to start dialing, when Dr. Doofenshmirtz took the ray gun and fired it. It hit the phone, causing it to disintegrate in her hand.

"I'm afraid I can't let you do that... daughter dearest!"

**To be continued...**


	3. Chapter 3

**A Family Feud**  
**Chapter Three**  
**Story Written by Freedom Fighter**

* * *

"Wait a minute... are you threatening me?" asked Vanessa.

"Well, it's more of a warning," replied Dr. Doofenshmirtz. "After all, if you're going to try and stop me, then you're no longer family. You're my nemesis!"

The evil scientist started walking towards his daughter, and in response she slowly backed away.

"Your nemesis? But what about..."

"Perry? Oh, he's small potatoes compared to someone like you! An actual human! Someone my size!"

"This isn't like you!" pleaded Vanessa. "I'm your daughter! You'd never try to hurt me, much less use a disintegration ray on me!"

"That was the old me! The new me... well, the new me can't take any chances!"

Heinz aimed the ray gun at Vanessa's head and fired. Noticing she was near the shopping bags she had brought in, she quickly reached in and pulled something out without looking. And just in time, as she put it in front of her head to block the ray.

The object was a gallon-sized tub of vanilla-flavored ice cream, which disintegrated, frozen goodness and all.

"Hey!" shouted Heinz. "That was supposed to be for my victory party! Now I'm really mad!"

Vanessa turned and made a run for it.

"Stand still so I can kill you!"

Dr. D fired at his daughter, and missed again, this time hitting an open crate... the one that the uranium rods had been delivered in.

"What did I say... I said **STAND STILL!**"

His rage continued to grow as he pulled the trigger once more. This shot was a lot closer than the last two, having been fired just as Vanessa tried to dive out of the way. The beam flew barely inches above her right leg, which at the time was in mid-air. It ended up flying to the balcony, where it hit a potted plant.

"Oof!" grunted Vanessa as her body hit the ground, stomach first.

Hitting the floor a little harder than expected, she winced in pain as she rolled over onto her back. She was gasping for air as she heard her father's footsteps draw ever closer.

"You can't do this!" Vanessa shouted, panic and fear settling in as opposed to any thoughts of trying to hide. "It's me... Vanessa! I'm your only child!"

She saw a smile on her father's face as he came into view.

"Wait a minute..."

Vanessa's eyes quickly shot to her left. Perry the Platypus! He could save her from her impending death!

Unfortunately, her hopes were dashed as he saw the secret agent still tied up, even as the mammal was desperately trying to break free to help.

That only left her with her original course of action... begging for her life.

"Dad... don't!"

She put her hands behind her and pushed herself off of the ground so that she was sitting slightly upright. If she had any intentions of trying to get back up on her feet, her father stopped her by straddling his legs over hers. He then pointed his ray gun at her head.

"It looks like I'm about to become childless!" Dr. D exclaimed, a remorseless sneer creeping across his face.

The eviler-than-normal villain began to pull the trigger, but halted when he heard a knock at the laboratory's front door.

"Who dares knock on my door?" bellowed the evil doctor.

He turned towards the door, and Vanessa instinctively saw this as her last chance to escape. She spread her legs out in a sweeping motion, fast enough to knock her father off of his feet. Dr. Doofenshmirtz fell backwards and onto the ground, his legs sticking up in the air.

With all the strength she could muster, Vanessa used her arms to scoot herself backwards a few feet, then to push herself up off of the ground and to a standing position. Once upright, she saw that the impact with the floor had caused her father to release his grip on his ray gun. It had slid three or four feet away from his right hand.

As Dr. Doofenshmirtz was trying to figure out what had just happened, Vanessa ran over, picked up the ray gun, and started running towards the door.

"C-c-come back here!" she heard her father yell behind her.

Bolting through the laboratory, she got back to her dad's work desk, where she gasped in surprise upon seeing a familiar face.

It was Ferb, who had noticed the small plastic bag of candy and was about to examine it.

"Ferb!"

Ferb turned his head to the sound of a voice his brain could only process as heavenly. And he saw the girl whom the voice belonged to running towards him...

Then grabbing him by the hand, and pulling him behind some nearby boxes.

"Ferb!" she shouted, in disbelief. "What are you doing here?"

Ferb replied by pulling out the funnel that had fallen out of Vanessa's bag in the parking lot.

"You followed me all the way here just to return this?"

Ferb nodded.

"I appreciate it, but I'm not sure I approve the part about you following... oh, never mind!"

Vanessa could discuss this with him later. She was more concerned about him having just put his life in danger.

"Look, you have to get out of here! It's not safe for you here!"

Ferb stared blankly at Vanessa, not understanding her demand to leave at all.

"I can't really explain it," Vanessa stated, though she actually was trying to, "but my dad's suddenly gone crazy! Evil crazy! And now he's going to kill me... literally!

That grabbed Ferb's attention. Vanessa saw him raise his left hand up to his chin, signaling that he was begin to think of a plan to save her. But she quickly grabbed his hand and pulled it down.

"Don't even think of being a hero! I don't want him killing you too!"

Vanessa then lifted her left arm to show the disintegration ray to him.

"Then again, I do have this thing. But what good will this do? I can't shoot him! He may have gone crazy, but he's still my dad!"

She sighed, at a loss at what to do now.

"What made him this way anyway?" she asked out loud. "He's never, ever been this hostile towards me..."

At that moment, Vanessa snapped her fingers as the realization hit her.

"The candy!"

The two of them peered over the boxes and towards the desk, where the little plastic bag continued to sit. And inside the clear bag, at the top of the pile of candy, was a lone pea-sized red gumball.

"Could it be... that there's some sort of candy out there that turns people evil when it's eaten? If that's true... then who would sell something like that?"

Ferb opened his mouth, about to explain that the candy Vanessa's dad had been eating hadn't been sold to him, but that it actually had been made by him and Phineas, and then thanks to a freak accident, somehow inexplicably for reasons he doesn't know, ended up in his candy bag.

But then Dr. Doofenshmirtz appeared before them, laughing evilly as he knocked some boxes aside to reveal their hiding place.

"Ha! I found you, Vanessa!"

He then noticed Ferb kneeling next to her for the first time.

"Say... isn't he a little too young to be hanging around with you?"

Vanessa was about to reply, but Ferb beat her to it.

"No, no I'm not."

The mad scientist didn't completely believe him, but he blew it off as he had more important matters to deal with. Such as the object behind his back, which he revealed to the two of them.

"Behold! My newest invention... the Crowbar-Inator!"

Yep, the object was... a simple crowbar.

"Hey, hey, wait a minute!" Doofenshmirtz suddenly made an objection to himself. "This is just an ordinary crowbar! I didn't even know I had one of these! Why am I holding it in the first place?"

Vanessa was now the one confused, as her dad now seemed to be speaking in his normal, lackadaisical tone of voice.

"Vanessa, when did you get back? Oh, and... who's your friend? Say... isn't he a little too young..."

"Dad!" Vanessa jumped up. "You're back to normal!"

"Normal? What are you talking about? **I'M EVIL!**"

"What? Dad, what's going on?"

"I don't know. **I DO... I'M EVIL, AND I'M ABOUT TO KILL MY DAUGHTER!** Who's inside me? Why would you think that way, she's my daughter! **SHE TRIED TO STOP MY PLAN!**"

Vanessa and Ferb watched as the good and evil sides of her father were out in full display, fighting for control.

"You mean the plan to melt all of the sugar in the tri-state area? **THE PLAN TO USE A DISINTEGRATOR TO... TO... WELL, I HADN'T THOUGHT THAT FAR AHEAD YET, BUT SOMETHING... EVIL!** How am I supposed to take over the tri-state area if you disintegrate it all, you nincompoop! **ARGH! I MUST REGAIN CONTROL!**"

"Control?" Vanessa thought out loud as her attention turned back towards the bag of candy. "The candy!"

Heinz dropped the crowbar and headed straight for the bag of candy.

"Dad, no!"

Vanessa cried out for him to stop, but Ferb had a more effective idea. He snatched the ray gun from her hands and aimed it at the bag. He pulled the trigger, and a beam shot out. Heinz saw it coming and jumped into the air, diving for the baggie. His outstretched arms extended out to grab it. But it wasn't enough.

The beam hit the bag, disintegrating it and its contents instantly.

"**NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!**" he screamed.

"Wow!" Vanessa exclaimed as she leaned over and gave Ferb a hug. "That was a great shot!"

She then got up and ran over to check on her father, who was now face down on the floor. Ferb grinned as he twirled the ray gun on his finger as if he were a cowboy, and then holstered it into his pocket.

"Dad, are you okay?"

Vanessa helped her father up, who was rubbing his aching forehead.

"What was all of that about?" he asked. "What just happened?"

"It's a long story."

"Ugh... tell me later. My head hurts. I'm gonna go lie down."

She watched as her dad slowly walked off, apparently not sure what had just transpired. Relieved that her dad was back to his old self, she turned around to thank Ferb once again.

There was only one problem... he was already gone.

"Ferb? Ferb, where'd you go?"

As Vanessa scanned the room for him, her father managed to make his way towards the center of the laboratory, where his confusion became more rampant when a suddenly free Perry the Platypus was casually trotting back to his hoverjet.

"Perry the Platypus? You're here too? Ow... when did you get here?"

Perry looked back, gave Doofenshmirtz a hand salute, and then hopped into his vehicle.

"Wait a minute!" Dr. D suddenly mistakenly concluded. "Did you already foil my evil scheme without me knowing it?"

Perry chirped his answer, then took off, flying back home. As his vehicle flew off into the distance, Doofenshmirtz ran onto the balcony, shaking his fist with anger.

"You're not even gonna tell me? You're making me figure it out myself? **CURSE YOU, PERRY THE PLATYPUS!**"

* * *

Half an hour later, Phineas and the others ran up to Ferb upon him finally returning home.

"There you are, Ferb!" Phineas shouted. "What took you so long?"

He then also noticed his stepbrother was empty-handed.

"And where's all the stuff?"

Ferb pulled out the Disintegrator from his pocket and aimed it at their invention-of-the-day. He squeezed the trigger, firing a blast that eradicated the device in the blink of an eye. The gang then watched as he placed the ray gun on the grass, produced a small sledgehammer, and smashed it into tiny bits before their eyes.

"Something tells me he found where the evil gumballs landed," concluded Isabella.

Phineas shuddered. "Man... if they can do that to someone like you, imagine what it would do to someone truly villainous."

Ferb winked at him, knowing his stepbrother had no idea how true his statement was.

"Looks like this is one rare invention for the scrap heap," admitted Phineas.

"I guess that's how it goes," Baljeet shrugged his shoulders before turning towards Buford. "Same time tomorrow?"

"Wouldn't miss it for the world."

**The End**

* * *

**Author's Notes:**  
And with that, we've reached the end of my first 'Phineas and Ferb' story. If you liked it, please leave a review! If you didn't... leave a review anyway... I love constructive criticism!

I wonder... did any of you catch the reference to the theme song? Or to 'Kim Possible,' via Baljeet's objection? If your a fan, I know you certainly did!

I hope it wasn't too far-fetched to have the gumballs fly all the way from the boys' backyard to Doofenshmirtz's plastic bag of candy. The show can have silly moments like this, so I believe I'm allowed to get away with it here.

One of the toughest things about writing this story was trying to make sure as many of the staples of the show were present. You know, Candace trying to bust her brothers, Agent P's mission briefing, etc. But as much as it filled space to move the story along, it also kept it from really expanding to my original vision.

The truth is, I actually wanted to have a battle akin to what Perry and Dr. Doofenshmirtz do on a regular basis... although not as full-on intense... with Vanessa in Perry's place. Sadly, it didn't write out that way, as I wanted to show off Vanessa's mad skills, like she had when she was running through the storage room in "Vanessassary Roughness."

Oh well... I'll plan better for it the next time...


End file.
